Monthly Archives: May 2013

All press is good press, and lots of press and online chatter about the Prius are leading to millions of dollars in free publicity for Toyota.

A study from GenSents Insights, a social analytics company, found that the Toyota Prius is the most discussed hybrid vehicle online, generating approximately $14.5 million in media value from January through April. Discussion of the Prius was monitored on Facebook, YouTube, Google, and other popular social media websites. Prius was mentioned in about 86,000 Twitter tweets, over 8,300 of them accumulating solely from a mention of the Prius by Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear fame.

Honda Fit came in second place at $4.5 million in online buzz, $10 million less than the Prius. Third, fourth, and fifth place were all very close with Chevrolet Volt at $3.1 million followed by Tesla Motors with $3 million and Honda Insight at $2.9 million.

Readers, we want to hear from you. Does online buzz about a car make you more likely to test drive it and ultimately buy it? Do you think the online buzz for the Toyota Prius is justified? Leave a comment below, and let us know what you think!

Recently, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) started using a new safety test measuring a vehicle’s effectiveness in front, side, rear, and roll-over crashes. Earlier this month, the 2014 Subaru Forester was officially the first vehicle to earn a perfect score on every single test.

When the 2014 Forester was tested, the IIHS was in the midst of testing 12 other small SUVs. Out of the 13 tested vehicles, only the Forester and the 2013 Mitsubishi Outlander were the only small SUVs to receive an acceptable rating or higher. The rest performed very poorly, receiving a poor or marginal rating from the IIHS.

How did the Forester perform so much better? First of all, the structure of the vehicle was significantly better than the rest of the SUVs with the exception of the Outlander. It held together in the frontal crashes, and the restraints and airbags worked properly. Other models in the test had issues with the airbag deploying and seatbelts letting the crash dummies’ heads and torso move too far forward.

The full IIHS report on the 2014 Subaru Forester is available online here.

President and CEO of Dodge Tim Kuniskis has announced that the 2013 Dodge Dart will be offering new special edition packages based on customer’s favorite features.

The Special Edition and Rallye Appearance Package will be available for the SXT and Limited Models and will range in cost from $395 to $1,810, and features will include power sunroofs, heated seats, remote start, Uconnect Voice Command, and more.

The base model starts at around $15,995, and Dodge has used a variety of ways to make the car more affordable and appealing to young people. Earlier this year, Dodge announced that car shoppers short on funds could crowd source the cost of the Dart, asking for people to pledge money in lieu of a gift for a birthday or high school graduation. With the announcement of these new special edition packages, Dodge is hoping to give the Dart a sales boost going into the summer and remind compact car shoppers that the Dart is a solid and affordable option.

Last week, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that the 2013 Ford Fusion Energi plug-in hybrid would receive a five-star safety rating, making it the third version of the 2013 Ford Fusion to receive a five-star rating.

Previously, the gasoline 2013 Ford Fusion and the Ford Fusion Hybrid had both received five-star ratings from the NHTSA. Broken down, each vehicle was rated up to five stars in frontal, side-impact, and rollover crash tests. The gasoline Fusion and Fusion Hybrid received five stars in the frontal test, four stars in the side-impact test, and four stars in the rollover crash test. Comparatively, the Energi earned scores of five stars in the frontal test, five stars in the side-impact test, and four stars in the rollover crash tests.

As if all of these honors weren’t enough, the gasoline Ford Fusion won The Car Connection’s Best Car to Buy 2013 award earlier this month, and the Fusion has also been named a Top Safety Pick from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Additionally, the Fusion Hybrid also won Green Car of the Year at the L.A. Auto Show and Autobytel’s 2013 Car of the Year.

New York, NY – May 29, 2013 – This week, Special Finance Group announced the launch of their new website for Approved Loan Store, their business-to-consumer division.

Approved Loan Store matches subprime credit car buyers with a special finance representative in an associated dealership. On the new website, prospective customers can learn more about the company, read auto news and buying tips, watch video testimonials from customers, or fill out a car loan application.

With the new upgrades, Approved Loan Store’s website is now compatible with all devices and operating systems including iPhone, iPad, Android, and Microsoft Surface. Approved Loan Store Founder Todd Campanella spoke about the site’s new features, saying, “It only makes sense that our website be accessible for all devices. We want to make the approval process more streamlined for everyone. If our customers give us five minutes to fill out the application, we will take care of the rest.”

“There is so much packed into the site now. Our Happy Customers page has this whole new redesign with brand-new written and video testimonials, and we’ve got the latest car news over on our blog. Hundreds of articles about what car to buy, how to get the best rates, which cars are best for families, you name it. You could spend hours on the site and not see everything, it’s really amazing.”

The launch of Approved Loan Store’s website corresponds with their new television ad campaign which started airing in early May. The ads features Robert, a DJ who needs a ride home from the club; Nicole, a young professional who just got her dream job but has no way to get to work; and the Nunez Family, parents who can’t stand the thought of their daughter going to her high school dance on the back of her boyfriend’s motorcycle. All of the television ads are available on the website as well as Approved Loan Store’s YouTube channel.

Approved Loan Store can be found online at http://www.approvedloanstore.com.

One week ago, Oklahoma was hit with a devastating tornado which destroyed neighborhoods and left 24 people dead. Now, the community is starting the process of rebuilding, and automakers including Ford, GM, and Chrysler have pledged their support.

Ford, GM, Chrysler, Toyota, Honda, and Volkswagen have all pledged funds or supplies. Ford has already donated a Transit Connect and $250,000 to the American Red Cross with the promise to match donations made through their website up to $250,000. Toyota and GM are putting their focus towards food service with Toyota donating $250,000 to various food service organizations and GM donating $50,000 and a 2013 Chevrolet Silverado to Forgotten Harvest.

Meanwhile, Chrysler has donated $100,000 to First Response Team of America, a non-profit supported by Lowe’s that helps communities rebuild after tropical storms and tornados. Volkswagen has donated $250,000 to Habitat for Humanity and the Red Cross, and the Red Cross is also getting help from Honda who donated power generators.

You can donate to these charitable organizations by following the links below.

Going into summer 2013, Ford and Chrysler are working furiously to produce more of their most popular vehicles. In an effort to keep up with the high demand, both automakers have announced that they will keep more of their plants open throughout the summer.

Typically, Ford and Chrysler will shut down their plants at certain points during the summer. Ford has a two-week summer shutdown, and Chrysler will usually shut down plants for a week or so. This year, Ford is reducing the two-week shutdown to one week, and some of the Chrysler plants will run through the whole summer with no shutdown. Ford will also add approximately 3,500 hourly jobs to keep the plants open. During that time, Ford plans to produce an additional 40,000 units.

So far this year, sales have been very good for Chrysler and Ford. Ram Trucks had a 49.3 percent volume sales increase in April with 32,124 units, and Ford had a 17.7 percent increase with 204,969 units. It is likely that sales for pickup trucks and other sporting vehicles like SUVs will increase even more as the summer goes on, so it makes perfect sense to keep the plants open longer and hire more employees.

Depending on which news media outlet you listen to, Tesla Motors is either an epic failure waiting to happen or a smashing success. This week, however, Tesla’s detractors will have to eat their words as the divisive auto maker will be repaying their Department of Energy loans as early as today.

The loans weren’t scheduled to be paid off for another nine years, but Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced via Twitter on Monday that, “Given govt loan repayment this week (prob Wed), Supercharger update will be next week. Work continuing independent of announcement.” With the loan being paid off early, it is estimated that taxpayers will see a $12 million profit from the loan.

May has been a good month for Tesla. They earned $562 million in their first quarter, $70 million more than the revenue estimates, and it was their first profitable quarter. Besides their financial success this quarter, Consumer Reports gave the Tesla Model S a score of 99 out of 100, the highest score any car has ever received from Consumer Reports.

The Tesla still has some hurdles to overcome including a price that is still a bit higher than some car buyers are willing to pay. Also, charging stations are still not prevalent across the country. Still, this is a big step forward for Tesla and for electric cars in general.